Bolivia’s president asks to see the love child he said was dead, in bizarre twist to graft probe of Chinese firm

Bolivian President Evo Morales said wants to see a son he says he’d long thought dead in a strange new twist to a scandal focused on his former girlfriend, who has been arrested as part of an influence-trafficking probe into the Chinese firm where she worked.

Morales’ former lover, Gabriela Zapata, was charged Saturday with illegal enrichment, laundering of unjust gains and influence trafficking as part of a probe by the government’s anti-corruption agency into a Chinese company that has won more than US$500 million worth of contracts with the state.

While the opposition accuses Morales of benefiting from the contracts, a claim he denies, most Bolivians have seemed more interested in the love child born of the secret romance.

READ MORE: Bolivian president’s ex-girlfriend, a top executive at Chinese contractor, is jailed amid graft probe

Morales has acknowledged a brief relationship with Zapata and said the two had a child together in 2007, but that the infant later died. However on Saturday, a woman claiming to be Zapata’s aunt said the child was alive and named Ernesto Fidel.

Morales said Monday that he had been led by Zapata to believe that the child had died, but celebrated that the boy was apparently alive and well.

“If the family allows it, I’ll pick up the child. I have a right to care for it,” Morales said in a statement to the press in which he didn’t allow any questions. “I hope in the coming hours they’ll bring me the child. I want to assume my responsibilities.”